Candia Looks to the Trash Business

By Rebecca Kaufman on Thursday, February 3, 2005.

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The growing town of Candia needs to find a new way to deal with their trash.

The town's incinerator is getting old and may need to be replaced. Some town officials think they've found a solution that would eliminate the town's solid waste budget and save the taxpayers money. They want to build a 10,000 square foot transfer station that could handle 500 tons of trash a day.

But Candia produces only about 30 tons of trash a week. That difference has some neighbors worried about the town's intentions.

New Hampshire Public Radio's Rebecca Kaufman has more.

Track 1: sound of living room
Brian Fortin: there's cookies, diet soda, please help yourself

Over 30 people crowded into Brian and Renee Fortin's Candia living room on a cold evening last week.

Track 1: 1:36: we're all here for the same reason, the transfer station proposed on Brown Road

The Fortin's home is just a half mile from the proposed transfer station site on Brown Road.

And almost all of the people gathered in the small living room live in that neighborhood.

Their concerns range from protecting Candia's rural character to potential problems of smell and increased traffic.

Resident Rand Cayer describes the area.

Track 16 2:52 there's bike trails there's snow mobile trails, there's moose, there's deer, that travel from bear brook to massabesic, how arethey going to get there, its really sad, it's the most beautiful spot, a lot of us moved here because of that

They came to lay out a plan of action to defeat the proposal at upcoming town meeting.

And early on it became clear to them that their biggest challenge would be convincing people on the other side of town that the transfer station is a bad idea.

Candia resident Ingrid Byrd was the only person at the meeting not from the neighborhood.

Track 9 :21 you cannot attack this problem as a I don?t want it in my neighborhood, it needs to be a candia issue and yet everything I've heard at the mobile station, and from the groups I work with is it's the brown road people that don't want it, its not candia doesn't want it

The group agreed and decided not to associate themselves with the name "Brown Road."

And after the meeting, Brian Fortin sounded very much on-message.

Track 15 1:16 my backyard is all of candia, my backyard is not just brown road, people are all on the same page we move here because we like the rural nature of candia, I don't want this facility on brown road, up the road, anywhere, it belongs in a commercial industrial area, in a community that can support it

Town officials presented the idea of a transfer station last year as a way to deal with what they call "Candia's trash problem."

The town presently uses an incinerator but in a few years it won't meet emission standards.

Town officials say upgrading the incinerator would be too costly so they began exploring other options.

And one jumped out at them as hard to resist.

A regional station where trash from Candia and other towns would be temporarily stored before going to a landfill.

Al Couch is chair of the solid waste committee.

:08 in looking at a lot of waste transfer operations around new Hampshire, they looked pretty good, very well run, we also had some waste haulers approach us and suggest to us there would be a large financial benefit to the town in order to accept a regional amount of trash from their trucks, and we did find out there could be a substantial benefit to the town

Town officials say in exchange for contracting out their transfer station, Candia would be able to dispose of all of their trash free of charge for the next 20 years.

And that, they say, would eliminate their present 400,000 dollar a year solid waste budget.

Plus, Candia would charge the waste company a host fee - an amount based on how much garbage goes through the front door.

Overall, selectmen chair Gary York projects that the plan could save each tax payer around 350 dollars a year.

Track 9 3:30 I think it deals with candia's solid waste for the long term, it deal with taxation for the long term, potentially that money could be used for open space for conservation land purchase, it could be use to lower taxes for potential school increases

But any projected tax relief wasn't much comfort to those back at the Fortin's home.

Many, like Andy Perry, say the town should focus on Candia's trash needs only.

Track 7
:00 how we deal with our waste problems should be of great concern to the town, should be, we can do that with curb side pickup, we can do that with bulk hauling, we can do that with compaction and hauling, there a variety of ways we can do it, but I think if we structure the debate on do we want to be known as candia the town, welcome to southern new hampshire's trash town, or do we want to be concerned about our waste treatment, do a better job at recycling

And Brian Fortin says what worries him is the increased daily truck traffic to the transfer station.

It's projected to be about 50 going in and 20 coming out.

Track 15 :19 my number one concern is the safety issue, there's a bus stop on the corner of route 101 and brown road, 70 trucks a day, they'll be backed up, children are going to get hit, the flow is just not condusive to safety issues

But former selectmen chair and now police commissioner Charlie Keller of the town of Auburn says he has heard these arguments before.

In Auburn, just down the road from Candia, there's a 600 ton per day transfer station.

Charlie Keller says when it was proposed back in the late 1990s the reaction from neighbors was extreme.

4:20 some of the people over there were so adamant against putting this is my neighborhood that they sold their homes just to get out, they just reached their resolve that they would not be a part and the town lost there because they were people I highly respected.

He says the concerns were exaggerated.

4:50 but as it turned out the traffic did not expand that much, the debris along the road did not materialize and the smell which they attributed to rats running around, that did not materialize, the town is a cleaner better place to live today than it was back then

That's unlikely to allay the fears of many Candia residents opposed to the project.

At the Fortin's home, resident Paul McHugh presented his line of attack.

Track 9 12:40 we a need a three level strategy, first is to go after it at town meeting, the second is to under the zoning and planning board and the third is to start lying down in the streets when they bring the construction trucks. crowd: you first!

But right now, they're focusing on stage one.

At town meeting next month residents will vote on a warrant article asking them to approve a 2 million dollar bond for the transfer station project.

It needs a 2/3 majority to pass.

For NHPR news, I'm RK.